I know that everyone travels to love alone,
alone to faith and death.
I’ve had my try. It doesn’t help.
Let me come with you.
  Yannis Ritsos, 1909-1990

the challenge     to enter the day
after the dream dissolves
in morning light     the weight of waking

having cooked eggplant with allspice
having paid my bills
having talked with nine healthcare administrators in the course of a week
and accomplished nothing
having failed to avoid the hydra of the news
having heard nothing from my sons for weeks
having failed to take my wife her chocolate cupcakes
having been naïve with a cyberthief

all these      the ingredients
from which I must make a poem
sitting at my desk
accompanied by the triumph and despair
of nine Greek poets

stand behind me     Yannis Ritsos
you suffered illness and imprisonment
I will be the tired performing bear of your Moonlight Sonata
while I try to write
while I try to play Bach on the piano
while I drive to see my wife
who likes chocolate cupcakes
who loves to see videos of her grandson
I am older than you were when you died